Crash Test Hacking For Dummies

February 14, 2018

What if you could work really hard and reinvent the internal structure of your organization every two or three days? Okay, that seems unlikely or, at the very least, exhausting. But what if you could establish a system or protocol in your network and data infrastructure that reinvented itself in rapid and unpredictable fashion so rapidly that would-be attackers lost interest in even attempting to penetrate your digital fortress? A recent Barron’s article about a company called Polyverse describes just such a scenario.

Instead of working under the assumption that code can be perfected and protected, their model suggests that organizations build into their systems the intention to crash under controlled circumstances and automatically insert a new and rebuilt version of the network. The constant cycle of change, of crash and rebuild, creates a “moving target defense,” using scrambled code and containerized applications and dependencies in a cycle of constant but predictable flux.

The Shape Of Things To Come

Most organizations are not in a position to execute a strategy like this. You have to be able to roll out fixes rapidly and cheaply in order to create the fluid responsiveness they describe. So maybe not today, but it’s certainly an indication of the ways things are headed.

For today, though, you need a team that can respond to your needs, identify your network’s vulnerabilities, and create a strategy that will deliver your network and data into the future safely and securely.